Commercial Solar
For the owner of a commercial building, adding PV solar is equivalent to adding a new lease holder tenant without any expansion of the facility. You essentially enjoy 20 years of "rent" in the form of avoided energy costs, rebates and on going Renewable Energy Credit (REC) payments monthly for 20 years assuming the size of the system is larger than 10kW. If the systems is smaller than 10kW then an even greater amount of upfront rebate helps with cash flow in the early years of the project.
Most businesses can benefit from the good will and "message" communicated to its customers about the seriousness of conserving electricity and using energy wiseley. Often commercial installation are not visible from the street and we have special public display monitoring systems that can be incorporated in the design to be certain that all customers can see the benefit of the energy being saved. In some cases solar can be incorporated in the facade or signage of the business in a prominent way and with good design parameters.
Additional tax incentives permitting accelerated depreciation of the system means that while the system will generate handsome revenue returns for over 25 years, the cot of the system can generally be written down in the first 5 years. This also lends to creative financing and loan term projects.
Energy Assessment / Usage Evaluation
For a commercial program we work to evaluate your current energy usage through review of your utility bill. Interpreting the utility bill, which can often be a "tricky science", particularly on tiered rates structures, usually helps identify target systems to compliment Solar. KVAR and lighting are among the adjustments that are always considered when we evaluate a commercial client. Importantly, we have special sophisticated test gear that can measure usage over several days and permit studying usage patterns and spikes to determine if changes can be made to reduce energy. Special KVAR units can be designed for the specific loads generated by a commercial user.
Commercial Solar Financing
Financing for a commercial project can be handled from
- operating funds
- loan programs
- PPA Agreements
In the case of loan programs SunTalk solar has access to commercial funds of up to $500k through affiliates of GE Money. Often these loans can be matched to the favorable first 5 years of tax incentives to help assure that the ownership of the system is as closely matched to the capital payments. Other loan programs are longer in their terms, with up to 25 years available for the lowest ongoing costs.
Power Purchase Agreements (PPA)
PPA's are generally special purpose funds that own a solar deployment. Typically, these PPA Agreements and installations tend to be over 500kW of capacity. They are also appropriate for non-profit government, schools and organizations. We are always on the lookout for PPA programs that can accommodate smaller systems so call today and we will provide the latest information we can.